Advertising Systems
Typically, advertisements are disseminated along with content through broadcast media such as radio and television. Generally, advertisers pay to expose their advertisements to public viewers. In the broadcast medium, advertisers pay to air ads during specified times for specified programs in an attempt to make an impression on an estimated demographic and population size that are known to view a given program. Nielsen's ratings provide such estimates and the broadcast industry employs Nielsen ratings to set the costs for airing advertisements. In turn, the advertising time provides advertisers with an opportunity to make an impression on an audience.
Local and national broadcast stations and networks sell advertising slots for particular channels, times and durations. The decision making for the context, timing, format, and placement of advertisements is made by high level advertising/marketing decision makers. The decision makers purchase advertising slots and provide a finished advertisement to local and/or national broadcasters. Accordingly, the broadcasters insert the ads into the programs that they broadcast.
On the World Wide Web, advertisers are known to pay for advertisement impressions. The impressions are measured by Information Servers that track the number of times an advertisement is loaded by a Web browser. As such, Web sites on the Internet are able to charge advertisers based on a measured number of impressions.
Information Technology Systems
Typically, users, which may be people and/or other systems, engage information technology systems (e.g., commonly computers) to facilitate information processing. In turn, computers employ processors to process information; such processors are often referred to as central processing units (CPU). A common form of processor is referred to as a microprocessor. A computer operating system, which, typically, is software executed by CPU on a computer, enables and facilitates users to access and operate computer information technology and resources. Common resources employed in information technology systems include: input and output mechanisms through which data may pass into and out of a computer; memory storage into which data may be saved; and processors by which information may be processed. Often information technology systems are used to collect data for later retrieval, analysis, and manipulation, commonly, which is facilitated through database software. Information technology systems provide interfaces that allow users to access and operate various system components.
User Interface
The function of computer interfaces in some respects is similar to automobile operation interfaces. Automobile operation interface elements such as steering wheels, gearshifts, and speedometers facilitate the access, operation, and display of automobile resources, functionality, and status. Computer interaction interface elements such as check boxes, cursors, menus, scrollers, and windows (collectively and commonly referred to as widgets) similarly facilitate the access, operation, and display of data and computer hardware and operating system resources, functionality, and status. Operation interfaces are commonly called user interfaces. Graphical user interfaces (GUIs) such as the Apple Macintosh Operating System's Aqua, Microsoft's Windows XP, or Unix's X-Windows provide a baseline and means of accessing and displaying information graphically to users.
Networks
Networks are commonly thought to comprise the interconnection and interoperation of clients, servers, and intermediary nodes in a graph topology. It should be noted that the term “server” as used herein refers generally to a computer, other device, software, or combination thereof that processes and responds to the requests of remote users across a communications network. Servers serve their information to requesting “clients.” The term “client” as used herein refers generally to a computer, other device, software, or combination thereof that is capable of processing and making requests and obtaining and processing any responses from servers across a communications network. A computer, other device, software, or combination thereof that facilitates, processes information and requests, and/or furthers the passage of information from a source user to a destination user is commonly referred to as a “node.” Networks are generally thought to facilitate the transfer of information from source points to destinations. A node specifically tasked with furthering the passage of information from a source to a destination is commonly called a “router.” There are many forms of networks such as Local Area Networks (LANs), Pico networks, Wide Area Networks (WANs), Wireless Networks (WLANs), etc. For example, the Internet is generally accepted as being an interconnection of a multitude of networks whereby remote clients and servers may access and interoperate with one another.